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The sport of soccer (more commonly known as "football" outside North America) has long been a predominantly men's game: men's clubs on every continent generate huge revenues and the FIFA World Cup is the most popular and profitable sporting event on the planet. Slowly but surely, however, women's soccer is starting to emerge from the long shadow cast by its male counterpart. In 2016, for example, 70,454 spectators gathered at Rio's Maracana stadium to watch a women's soccer semi-final between Sweden and Brazil. The previous year, 53,341 spectators attended the final of the 7th FIFA Women's World Cup at BC Place in Vancouver, Canada. And now, the National Women's Soccer League (NWSL), founded in the United States in 2013, is attempting to prove that a national women's professional league can be profitable. In short, all the stars seem to be aligned for the professionalization of women's soccer, i.e., the organizational transformation familiar to the federations, clubs, national teams, and other organizations that make up the core of this truly global sport. The case examines the history, issues, and challenges faced by attempts on American soil to carve out a place for women at the highest levels of the world's most practised sport.

As it approaches its 20th anniversary, Major League Soccer (MLS), the top professional soccer league in the United States and Canada, has the wind in its sails. Whether it's new TV deals, the massive hiring of European and South American stars, or club and stadium expansions, the league is seeking to build momentum to compete with the major European and Mexican leagues as well as with rivals in the other professional sports leagues in North America, where the market is undergoing a radical demographic shift. However, MLS still has a long way to go to fulfill its ambitions: there is a high level of competition, the league's financial situation is shaky, its governance structure is complex, and the quality of play remains inferior to that of the major soccer leagues. This case traces the evolution of the league since its creation and draws a portrait of the business context within which MLS is seeking to make its mark.

The National Football League (NFL) is one of the most lucrative professional sports leagues in the world. A multi-billion dollar enterprise with millions of fans filling stadiums or riveted to their screens on game day, the NFL and its teams have, over the years, been led by strong personalities who have built up an empire that is the envy of managers in every other professional sport. The result of a merger between two leagues, the NFL has experienced phenomenal growth since its founding in 1920. Its business model has evolved significantly over the years. One of its distinguishing features is its revenue-sharing model, which favours parity by distributing revenue generated by the League evenly among its teams. Despite its commercial and financial success, however, the NFL has had to pay particular attention to its brand image, which has often been tarnished by incidents related to player conduct off the field, as well as to issues related to the protection and health of players. The encounter between a successful business model and the management of the various crises that have marked the contemporary history of the NFL makes this organization a fascinating subject of study for anyone interested in management.

A young engineer at a major Quebec construction company realizes that, over time, he has placed himself in a tricky legal and ethical position: at the request of his immediate superior, a man he respects and to whom he feels indebted, he has repeatedly falsified cost estimates for the public works projects his company is bidding on. The young man thinks about what he should do and the potential impact of his decision on his career and loved ones.

FC Barcelona ranks as one of the world's most prestigious soccer clubs. Its legal status as a not-for-profit sporting club along with its collective ownership model and democratic structures set it apart from most other world-class teams. Since its founding in 1899, the club has had a rich history of sporting success tempered by recurring periods of financial instability. Its founder, Joan Gamper, made national identity a core element of his strategy for the club, turning it into a veritable symbol of Catalan nationalism. Despite the best efforts of the Francoist regime to "Spanify" the club, to this day it remains a powerful source of pride and national identity for the vast majority of Catalonians. After over a century of sporting exploits mixed with disappointments and internal conflict, the implementation of an aggressive strategy of modernization in the early 2000s has proved highly effective, as evidenced by the club's remarkable achievements on the field and its new-found financial stability. This case examines the evolution of this organization against the backdrop of the Spanish and Catalan socio-political context.